Psychology ethical issues

Ethical issues are the situations that create ethical dilemmas for the researcher due to the conflicts between the goals of the researcher and the rights of the participants.

Deception: misleading participants; issue whether to decieve or not

- researcher's point of view: sometimes necessary, wouldn't be valid

e.g Asch's visual perception/ conformity test

-Participants point of view, being decieved stops fully informed consent, might not have actually taken part, beings psychology disrespute

Fully informed consent: being given full explanation of the aims and purpose. issue whether to tell or not

-researcher's point of view: justified with similar reasons to deception, demand characteristics, affect internal validity making results meaningless

-Participant's point of view: unable to make considered decision if not informed whether to take part or not, right of autonomy being compromised, no guarantee they would take part if they knew the full aims

Harm to participants: the responsibility of the researcher to protect the participants from both physical and psychological harm including harm to self esteem.

-Researcher's point of view: harm to participants can't always be anticipated